The new iOS-based Hasbro Lazer Tag guns are fun and high-tech, but be prepared to deal with bugs.

There is a difference between "laser tag" and "lazer tag." Laser tag is any toy or attraction that uses lasers or infrared beams to track hits in a gun battle-like setting. Lazer tag is Hasbro's brand of laser tag toys. Now that that's out of the way, I hope you can forgive the alternating of "laser tag" and "Lazer Tag" in this review. Hasbro has some new Lazer Tag laser tag guns that combine infrared beams with iPhone and iPod Touch-based augmented reality to make a laser tag game with multiple weapons, modes, and upgrades. The guns themselves are available for $39.99 (list) , or you can get a pair for $74.99 (list). You can also use the free iOS app with your iPhone 4, iPhone 4S, or recent iPod Touch, but without a big plastic gun to connect to it, there isn't much to it.

The BlasterThe gun itself is a high-tech, brightly colored plastic pistol available in white with orange and grey accents, or yellow with grey and white accents. It looks similar to Hasbro's Nerf Vortex Vigilon pistol, but it doesn't shoot foam discs or darts. The device is powered by six AA batteries that fit into the butt of the gun behind a screw-locked door. There are two triggers in the finger guard of the gun, and a third reload button on the underside of the hand guard. The right side of the barrel holds the power switch and a switch that sets the gun to work indoors or outdoors, adjusting sensitivity to work under different lighting conditions. A large rectangular case on the butt of the gun serves as a mount for your iPhone or iPod Touch , with removable grey rubber sleeves for either device included with the gun. The gun comes with rubber sleeves for both devices, and it connects to them through the built-in 3.5mm audio cable; while it only works with the iPhone or iPod Touch, it doesn't use a 30-pin iPod connector and doesn't charge or get power from those devices.

You don't need an iPhone or iPod Touch to play Lazer Tag, but they're required for most of the interesting features. Without one, you can still play Lazer Tag, but the scoring and settings are done entirely through audio prompts and you can only use two weapons: a single-shot pistol and a machine gun. You also need someone else to play with if you don't have an iOS device.

The AppThe Lazer Tag app for iOS adds a load of features to Lazer Tag, and integrates easily into the gun. With the app, you can assign multiple players to up to three teams, select and upgrade multiple weapons, and even play single-player games with the device's camera and augmented reality. While you can play the single-player mode using only augmented reality and the phone's camera without a Lazer Tag gun at all, you need the gun itself if you want to play multiplayer. The gun has multiple sensors and infrared emitters to both show your position on other players' guns and let you aim at them yourself. You just need to remember to turn the gun on when you start the Lazer Tag app; otherwise they won't work together.

The app worked without issue on the iPod Touch and iPhone 4, but coworkers who tried the app with the iPhone 4S saw it crash several times during a match. This is a big problem, because it can throw off the accuracy of matches since the guns aren't directly connected and put the action on hold while the app is restarted. Hasbro will hopefully release updates to the app in the future to improve stability.

The app's single player mode is a series of six shooting gallery levels that use the iPhone's camera to make aliens appear around you (on the screen). The regular trigger fires the gun, while the forward trigger raises a temporary shield to protect you from fire, and the underside button reloads guns with a tap and lets you select your weapon by holding it down. There are a handful of alien types, but the mode gets tedious pretty fast. Hopefully Hasbro will update the Lazer Tag app with multiple modes in the future, because the single player mode is currently only good for practice and to build up "energy" to buy and upgrade weapons. The weapons can be used in both single player and multiplayer mode, so if your friends haven't been playing as much as you they'll be at a disadvantage. To be fair, you might want to hold off on upgrading the pistol and make sure everyone only plays with the pistol.

Playing and ConclusionMultiplayer with the Lazer Tag app is really fun, with the same shoot-shield-reload controls of the single-player mode. I played a two-on-two game with my coworkers in the PCMag.com Labs, and it was easy to set up two teams and start fighting. Because each app works separately, both starting and ending matches requires a cooperative effort. Players need to coordinate to press the appropriate team or solo button on the tap to start the match, and when the match is over players need to compare the hits they scored according to their apps (though the gun will audibly say if its player was knocked out).

Hasbro's new augmented reality Lazer Tag guns are a fun take on the classic laser tag format, but they're not perfect. Using the guns in combination with the iOS app adds a lot of variety to the game, but because nothing is connected you won't come close to the experience and balance of a fully-equipped laser tag arena. Most (or least, depending on your point of view) egregiously, the Lazer Tag guns don't actually use lasers; you have to approximate your shots without a pointer if you don't use an iOS device, and you have to use the on-screen crosshairs if you do. It feels like it's missing something without that bright red dot, but it's still good for injecting some action int a lazy afternoon. They're silly fun, and that's what matters most.

About the Author

Will Greenwald has been covering consumer technology for a decade, and has served on the editorial staffs of CNET.com, Sound & Vision, and Maximum PC. His work and analysis has been seen in GamePro, Tested.com, Geek.com, and several other publications. He currently covers consumer electronics in the PC Labs as the in-house home entertainment expert... See Full Bio

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